Covid has broken the social contract between parents and schools
I spend a lot of time talking to parents in focus groups about all sorts of educational issues, but it still took me ages to get to the bottom of why school attendance has fallen off a cliff.
I had absentmindedly assumed that it was down to a grim combination of a few things: the many mental health troubles affecting young people today that relate to the pandemic; remote working making it easier for parents to keep their kids at home with a sniffle; the cost-of-living crisis biting in such a way that there are many more families who are struggling to get the basics right.
But I was missing the mark. While all of those factors play some role in the fact that persistent school absence has doubled since the end of the pandemic – the main reason is deeper, more intractable, and much more worrying.
In short, the social contract between parents and schools was broken by Covid. A report that I co-authored and that was published yesterday found that parents across the country – and across all classes – no longer believe it is their responsibility to get their kids to school full time.
The idea of mandatory full-time schooling appears to be dying.
The whole piece is well worth reading, in part because other attitudes may have changed and other social contracts may have been broken.
I had absentmindedly assumed that it was down to a grim combination of a few things: the many mental health troubles affecting young people today that relate to the pandemic; remote working making it easier for parents to keep their kids at home with a sniffle; the cost-of-living crisis biting in such a way that there are many more families who are struggling to get the basics right.
But I was missing the mark. While all of those factors play some role in the fact that persistent school absence has doubled since the end of the pandemic – the main reason is deeper, more intractable, and much more worrying.
In short, the social contract between parents and schools was broken by Covid. A report that I co-authored and that was published yesterday found that parents across the country – and across all classes – no longer believe it is their responsibility to get their kids to school full time.
The idea of mandatory full-time schooling appears to be dying.
The whole piece is well worth reading, in part because other attitudes may have changed and other social contracts may have been broken.
Attitudes towards GP services for example. In a wider sense, lockdown may have changed attitudes in ways which have yet to become apparent, such as attitudes towards services which are important and those we could do without because during lockdown we did do without them.
The messaging – which is factually correct, by the way – that every single day in school matters simply doesn’t wash anymore. If schools were shuttered for six months during Covid, then why would a day or two off to go to Alton Towers matter, went the argument I heard time and again.
One working class mum put it like this to me: ‘Pre-Covid, I was very much about getting the kids into school, you know, attendance was a big thing. Education was a major thing. After Covid, I’m not gonna lie to you, my take on attendance and absence now is like I don’t really care anymore. Life’s too short.’
The messaging – which is factually correct, by the way – that every single day in school matters simply doesn’t wash anymore. If schools were shuttered for six months during Covid, then why would a day or two off to go to Alton Towers matter, went the argument I heard time and again.
One working class mum put it like this to me: ‘Pre-Covid, I was very much about getting the kids into school, you know, attendance was a big thing. Education was a major thing. After Covid, I’m not gonna lie to you, my take on attendance and absence now is like I don’t really care anymore. Life’s too short.’
9 comments:
For many years my parents took us on holiday for the last week of school summer term on the grounds that nobody learned anything in that week anyway.
But in my last year I was too old to be interested in a "family holiday" so I went to school. This had three advantages. (i) I was able to take part in the Sports Day (4 x 110 yards relay, since you ask), and (ii) I was able to make a book on the school Sports Championship, thus making me a pleasing amount of money while showing me just how many people really are mugs.
(iii) It also gave me a few more days in the company of classmates whom I might never meet again, which I was glad of.
All good points made by the article, and there's another one worthy of consideration. The lockdown literally brought educational standards home to many parents. They watched the Zoom lessons, they read through the on-line materials, and they assessed the efficiency of the communication.
Most of what I saw was pretty dire, and a lot of it was a waste of time. When my son had completed the basic tasks, he had the option of an "extension activity" which consisted of writing and performing a rap song about the historical period being studied. Often, there were a few meagre questions based on a chunk of text, followed up by a recommendation to write about their feelings, or imagine they were one of the people being studied. Questions and instructions were poorly phrased, and lots of time was spent waiting around.
Teachers were, of course, struggling with a new situation, and they would have improved over time. But it was obvious that these people were not the hard-working professionals we were led to believe.
I wonder if lockdowns have turned out to be an inverse revolution.
Typical revolutions involve ordinary people vigorously protesting at the scarcity of resources. In the case of lockdowns the scarcity of resources was vigorously imposed on ordinary people. And they got the hint that post revolution attitudes were required.
The Black Death, although much, much, worse than COVID, was followed by decades of social readjustment. The Aristocracy and the Clergy were diminished in the eyes of the populace and controls on the wages of labourers (now a scarce resource) and price controls on bread could not be maintained.
I rather fancy that some of the criticism of national and global authorities (e.g. national medical bodies, the WHO, the UN) has been driven by their stellar performance (irony) during lockdowns. Many businesses have ended (particularly retail ones) because the lockdowns upset the operating conditions.
It's a shame that our politicians are trying so hard to restore the old social contract, or to impose the Great Reset, because they have lost a substantial proportion of the respect for the Great and Good that they used to have.
I expect that school attendance is just one more symptom.
dearieme - I don't recall ever missing a day for any reason apart from illness. Towards the end of the fifth form year we were all astounded when a classmate was given some kind of recognition because he hadn't missed a day in five years. The last I saw of him was when he came to the door as a Jehovah's Witness. He seemed surprised to see me and never came again.
Sam - I read through quite a lot of our grandson's online material and it was dire too. You are right, a point missed by the article is that we discovered that these people were not the hard-working professionals presented to us. I wouldn't do the job though - it sounds impossible.
DJ - that seems to be it, school attendance is a symptom. There are signs of the pendulum swinging back in a number of areas as leaders belatedly work out that some of their notions can't be done and they might be held responsible. It's a slow business though.
I don't suppose the inclusion of climate change and gender studies in the school learning materials exactly inspires parents either nor would encourage participation in school with teachers, probably lead to rows and discord. Besides, so many children learn nothing in school anyway, it would make no damn difference if they took days or weeks off. Have you seen GCSE papers in say Physics? Dreadful. An A* isn't worth the paper it's written on.
We're not alone, then. We both developed our contempt for so many teachers through working in schools for many years. Bitter experience of the Not a Health Service has taught us that not only is it a top-heavy self-centred bureaucracy but it has refined its "so what" outlook to "take the money and take the piss"
Tammly - it's an interesting question - how much do kids learn in school? Our grandson is just starting his GCSE year but already seems to be aware of the limitations of school. They learn to socialise in a rules-based environment of course, but there are other ways of doing that.
Jannie - bureaucracy seems to be the common problem, plus the way organisations are funded. If the money followed the pupil and the patient we'd see changes.
"I don't recall ever missing a day for any reason apart from illness." In my final year I took a day off to sit a scholarship exam.
By virtue of completing the afternoon paper early, and driving my father's car briskly, I got back to school in time to skipper my house cricket side. Since I filled the gap between the morning and afternoon papers by scoffing fish and chips and mooching around a good book shop, it all added up to a jolly good day.
dearieme - a day to remember from the sound of it. We haven't scoffed fish and chips for ages, portions are too big these days.
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